"Mad Men" Coming Back, But Not Until 2012

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"Mad Men" fans - there's good news and there's bad news. Good news: "Mad Men" will be back. Bad news: Not until 2012.

Of course, there are no such guarantees for show creator Matthew Weiner.

Negotiations between AMC and Weiner have not been going terribly well, leaving many fearing that the show would not be back at all. Well those fears were for naught, at least according to their official statement:

"AMC has officially authorized production of season 5 of Mad Men, triggering our option with Lionsgate (Mad Men's production company)," the network said. "While we are getting a later start than in years past due to ongoing, key non-cast negotiations, Mad Men will be back for a fifth season in early 2012."

Not exactly an enthusiastic declaration, is it?

With an option of season 5 in hand, there was no chance that AMC wouldn't bring the show back, but Weiner is another matter all together. At issue between the showrunner and the network are things like product integration, trimming episode length to allow for more advertising and cutting two characters from the show.

But as Vulture notes, the show already has product integration, even cutting a couple of minutes would leave one of TVs's longer shows and all the principles are already signed through season 5, so it's unlikely it would be major characters on the chopping block.

Oh, and they've offered Weiner $30 million.

We're guessing he'll come around.

Published at 1:55 PM EDT on Mar 29, 2011 | Updated at 2:42 PM EDT on May 30, 2012